Emirates Voted Best Airline for Vegan Meals by Vegan Travelers

Dubai-based carrier Emirates was voted the top airline for vegan meals in a recent poll conducted by Vegan News.

This is based on the responses of 154 vegan world travelers from around the globe who, as a whole, selected 29 different international airlines that they feel served the best vegan airplane meals they’ve ever had.

It’s important to note that there are numerous variables that determine the quality of an onboard meal, including the route and catering company (more on that later). With that in mind, here are the best airlines for vegan food.

1. Emirates

With a score of 28, Emirates finished convincingly as the airline that serves the best vegan meals. The company also received a sizable number of 2nd place votes by travelers who did not choose it as their favorite.

Emirates vegan meal—- Facebook/ Louise Carron Harris

One user, who did not take part in our poll, posted the image above on Facebook, writing: “Emirates airline have Nailed vegan food!!! All my meals were amazing. She added that her companion “had veggie and hers were awesome too soooo good felt amazing and nourished after all my meals”

One respondent to our poll said: “I have had good experiences with the vegan food on Emirates.” Another added: “Emirates were incredible!”

2. Singapore Airlines

Singapore Airlines finished 2nd with a score of 17 and was consistently ranked in the top 3 of most vegan travelers who reported flying the airline.

3. EVA Air

In a post on Instagram, one user wrote a caption to the preceding image that states: “If you are vegan and flying, try Eva Air. In my opinion, they really take good care of vegans onboard. Look at the spread here! Penne Pasta cooked with Olives, Asparagus and Peppers, Fruit Salad, a Bun with Magarine Spread, a Coffee-Flavoured Cake with Desiccated Coconut, Fruits, Orange juice, Water and of course Coffee that came later.”

“EVA airways serves pretty decent Vegan (& Vegetarian) meal. They even served quinoa aplenty together with something decently spiced,” said a respondent to our poll.

4. Qatar Airways

Qatar’s meals had positive reviews from vegans who had flown the airline, and it comes in at number four with a score of 11.

One respondent to our poll provided us with the image above and wrote: “Qatar Airways served the best vegan/veganized meals.”

“All 3 meals during my flight was so good, passengers next to me asked how to order them,” he added.

Another respondent said: “Qatar Airways was great. When flying to Australia from Ireland I had some rice and veggies curry, a wrap, a savoury veggie mix, a chocolate muffin lots of fruit and sweets. Was well fed and didn’t need any of my emergency snacks.”

5. Turkish Airlines

With almost entirely positive reviews of its vegan meals, this airline secured its place in the top 10.

Instagram/megeatshappy

One traveler described the meal above by writing: “The main was some kind of mixed veggie/ tomato rice thing with some bread (VEGAN BUTTER) some hummus with an unwanted olive AND A VEGAN DOUGHNUT ? the food was actually really tasty.”

6. Air New Zealand

Air New Zealand could have definitely finished several places higher if the scoring gave partial credit to second place votes because this airline had several of them. However, we only counted each user’s favorite and therefore, Air New Zealand finishes at number 6.

7. Qantas

While the Australian airline Qantas was actually tied in 6th place with Air New Zealand, we gave them the slight edge due to the fact that more respondents selected Air New Zealand as their second choice.

Image: Facebook/MCAT Cooking

According to one user, the Qantas breakfast included vegan yogurt and a blueberry muffin, described as “thoughtful” by the traveler. “Very impressed with #vegan breakfast aboard Quantas,” the traveler stated.

8. Etihad Airways

Most vegan travelers had positive things to say about the UAE flag carrier Etihad Airways, which comes in at a respectable 8th.

Etihad vegan meal— Image: Facebook/Kaisei Inoue

“VGML (completely vegan for me) on Etihad flight from Brussels to Sydney. Very good, healthy and yummy,” on user wrote.

9. KLM

While KLM didn’t receive quite as many votes as some other airlines, travelers who had flown the airline had almost entirely positive things to say about their vegan meals.

Image credit: Instagram/the_svatta

A user who posted an instagram image of the food pictured wrote: “Best vegan meal at KLM flight.”

10. Japan Airlines

Japan Airlines rounds out the top 10, with travelers giving the company overall positive reviews for its vegan meals.

Methodology

Most of the vegan world travelers polled by Vegan News were members of various vegan travel groups, but we also reached out to other non-travel related vegan groups to find participants for our poll.

The groups we reached out to had a combined membership or subscription of over 350,000, but Vegan News focused on the results gathered from polling 152 vegan world travelers for the purpose of this article.

Each respondent could only choose one airline to count toward the results, and if respondents submitted more than one response, they were asked to choose one.

Each vote was counted as one point, and the airlines with the highest point totals were ranked accordingly.

While some users decided to tell us their 2nd, 3rd or 4th favorites, that information was not given any weight for this poll, though it was noted in this article.

Variables

According to catering company Sky Chefs, “airlines work with airline caterers, and sometimes celebrity chefs, to come up with menus. Dishes are decided based on trends and routes, and recipes and processes are tweaked for optimal taste at 35,000 feet.”

As trends change, so do the meals that airlines serve. As such, there can be travelers with a variety of reports on a single airline’s food, and that’s without factoring people’s differences in taste. So, there will generally be varying opinions on the quality of an airline’s meals.

However, what a poll like this can show is the patterns in airlines that provide meals which a high percentage of passengers consider to be of good quality.

Full Results

Airline

Score

Emirates

28

Singapore

17

EVA

13

Qatar

11

Turkish Airlines

9

Air New Zealand

8

Qantas

8

Etihad

7

KLM

6

JAL

5

Philippine Airlines

4

Virgin Atlantic

4

Silk Air

4

Virgin Australia

4

British Airways

4

China Southern

3

American

3

Air Canada

2

Air India

2

China Airlines

2

Cathay Pacific

2

Saudi Arabian

1

Ethiopian

1

EgyptAir

1

Swiss Air

1

LATAM

1

Malaysian

1

Norweigan

1

Icelandic

1

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Paul is a former writing teacher turned writer. He loves to travel the world (the southeast Asia region in particular), meet people from a variety of cultures and learn about various lifestyles. When he's not doing one of those things, he's probably reading non-fiction or watching YouTube videos.
Contact: paul@vegannews.co